Qualcomm’s Snapdragon Ride is Way into Processing Autonomous Driving

Most mobile users will be aware of
Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chips, located in several mobile handsets from different
companies. However, what most users may not know is that Qualcomm has been busy
leveraging the name Snapdragon to use in a complete autonomous processing
stack. Snapdragon Ride is a comprehensive platform that Qualcomm intends to
promote as a simple yet powerful solution for autonomous vehicle manufacturers.

A Complete System

The Snapdragon Ride platform consists of
three separate entities. The first is the Snapdragon Ride Safety
system-on-a-chip, which will incorporate all safety monitoring measures for the
vehicle on a single processor. The Snapdragon Ride Safety Accelerator and
Snapdragon Ride Autonomous Stack rounds out the elements that make up the
system overall. These three systems are air-cooled as opposed to water-cooled –
a boon to car manufacturers who prefer having lower-powered systems for driving
control since it allows them to extend the range of the vehicle with the extra
battery power.

A Safe, Secure, and Extensible Framework

The safety systems incorporated with the
Ride platform are useful for automakers. Things like street sign recognition
and automatic emergency braking form a core part of an autonomous vehicle. In
the future, Snapdragon expects that they will be able to incorporate technology
like self-parking or automated highway driving. The aim is to offer a
processing stack for use with Level 4 and Level 5 autonomous vehicles.

While most vehicle manufacturers today have
Level 2 systems, Qualcomm understands that this is the building point that all
autonomous vehicles will start. As cars develop and become more
self-sufficient, the Ride platform is designed to evolve with them. Qualcomm
intends to offer Snapdragon Ride commercially within the first half of 2020.
Future development of the system will include updates such as energy-efficient
AI systems and computer vision engines that will help vehicles with their
navigation of roads and communication with nearby devices.